Friday, May 3, 2013

going beyond

We discovered Boo wasn't seeing quite 'right' while she was riding her bike. She was 3. I forget that was how we stumbled across it until someone asks, "She was so young how did you know?". We didn't know. We had a little kid dismounting from her trike to walk it over nonexistent dips in the trail.

And we had no idea the road which lay ahead of us. We didn't know enough to be scared or ask the questions. Will she see well enough to read like her friends? Will she be able to pass a drivers test? Will she be able to see the difference between shadow and a ledge, a solid curb and ramp, and will biking with her to IFA be the most trying, nerve racking 20 minutes of my day?

When she is on her bike her disability is glaring. This is not the Boo you all know. This is the Boo who showers with the curtain open because she has no vision in low light. The Boo who has to have her gym list read to her because the print is too small and close together. The Boo who cries when she can't see something that everyone else can see.

Whether she is behind me or in front of me when we bike I have to see what she can't. I warn her about dips, poles, curbs, and other bikers. But honestly, I don't know what she can and can't see. She is incredibly patient with my constant announcements. Patient with herself.

Today we navigated the entrance to the parking lot while a car waiting to turn watched as first Boo turned one driveway too soon into a truck repair shop. I talked her back out to the bike lane she clipped a fence pole on the way but managed to stay on her bike, the driver still waiting for us to clear the way, Boo fighting back tears of embarrassment & frustration She headed into the IFA lot turned the wrong way and again I had to get her to circle out to the right side and out of the path of cars.

This is crazy she can't see, she shouldn't be biking....I thought it. I could see us, how we had fought our way through something so simple and yet so complex:: a bike ride.

It's good to do things you shouldn't do.

And it's good to know you have a great friend who gave you a tandem bike for when you need it!!!

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About Me

I am the mom of 4 kids. That is a lot of kids! Homeschooling the youngest, Beach, our little ninja. She is a competitive gymnast with tons of personality & a unique perspective on life. She makes her own way through the world with a visual disability. We live, farm, & school on a small urban farmstead west of the beautiful city of SLC.